Page 77 of Valdemar

“I was trying to name something we had no name for yet. It fit, as an explanative term, but this imagery, when I concentrated on the finer patterns, I could actually taste them on my tongue. Like hearing a sound and you can feel a memory associated with it on your skin, only another sense was suited to interpret what was now being said.” Jonaton waited for a response.

“That’s amazing,” Kordas flowed in as if rehearsed. “It’s because you’re a very remarkable person, Jonaton. No one else would have understood that with all their senses.”

“And I’m still not sure I’ll tell Silvermoon about the implications. We can keep at least a few secrets for ourselves, Your Majesty?”

Kordas frowned a moment. “You know how I am about sharing lifesaving knowledge,” he said defensively.

“I do! I do know, Kordas, and I love you for it, but while there are forces in this world that can take over people’s minds, curse them, and ensnare and inhabit their bodies, I am going to come up with ways to stop everyone I’ll ever know. It’s merciful, to me. If an ally or courtier suddenly turns on us, it will be handled quickly.” Jonaton licked his lips and continued. “Which brings us to why the flavor is important—I can understand what structural principles a spell field is built on, and deduce its intent. Maybe unsurprisingly, magic meant to heal is pleasant, and magic made to destroy tastes acrid. The secondary notes in the taste give further detail. So here it is, and believe me, it tastes rancid.”

Jonaton showed the Coronation Day protective fields as illuminated yellow, and barely any stray energy flared from it all despite its power. A red circle appeared in the north, above the Palace and in midair. Moments later a representation of what must have been the Red Thing hurtled out of the opened Gate. It appeared to be a ball of woven vines. Jonaton made the representation larger and there were—people woven into it.

“Gods and Powers—” Kordas began, and Restil felt suddenly both bolt-awake and queasy.

:Calm, calm, Chosen,:Darshay’s Mindvoice implored. :I am sad to say it, but it is what it looks like. Living sacrifice to power spellwork is a foul and cruel enterprise by its nature.:

Jonaton didn’t say anything, but reduced the Red Thing to the previous scale and tracked its path from the sky, in a clean arc to the shields over the Palace and city. “The circular shape tells us it was a mid-air Gate. The trajectory tells us the Red Thing was launched with considerable speed. I’d guess it went down a ramp to gain speed, with the Gate entry at the end. This is when it hit,” Jonaton said gravely as if he had a bad taste in his mouth. The impact broke the sphere outward into a larger, but still cohesive, ball of energy that rebounded away off of the shields’ curves and continued to fall. Jonaton paused the diagram again. “This eruption on impact was cut short. I’d guess it had a failsafe based upon its speed—it was supposed to have hit the ground and detonated, but it hadn’t fallen enough yet when the shields slowed it. It wasn’t an explosive as most would understand it. It was made to . . .” and he licked his lips again, “. . . dismantle air, is the best way to put it. As it spread outward, it would have killed everything breathing in a league’s radius in moments. Everything, down to the insects.”

Kordas’s face went immediately grim, and Restil felt a big, cold ball suddenly form where his stomach was.

“The Palace—” Isla breathed. “And Haven.”

“I was waiting for you to have time to look at this before I finished the refinements, so . . . might as well do it now.” He frowned at the diagram and made some tweaks and alterations. The diagram shivered, then changed. And Restil made an inarticulate sound of horror as he thought about all those people, innocently watching what they thought were pretty illusions.

The diagram continued to move, showing now what had actually happened. “And this is what happened to it. It stopped expanding in mid-eruption because the casing broke prematurely upon impact with the shields. It rolled off, and we all thought it was a lightshow as part of the festivities.” Jonaton manipulated the illusion with his fingertips. “Here, the flavor changes.” He tapped at the image. “And here, it is halfway changed and maybe twenty, twenty-five horselengths from the ground. By now it has rolled along the shield dome, across the river, and into the pasture’s little forest. When it hits, it isn’t the same flavor of magic at all. It has the absence of flavor. It’s completely purified.”

Kordas frowned, and Isla looked puzzled. It was Isla who spoke. “Wait, you mean in a sense, right? Not literally. All the texts say that ‘purified’ magic is supposed to be an idea, an impossible goal to strive for. We mortals try to get close on our best days.”

“I said what I said,” Jonaton replied, apparently miffed that their tiny Kingdom had hosted something so monumental as a true purification without him being any part of it at all.

“The Grove,” Kordas said, but it needn’t have been spoken. They all knew, which meant the Companions now knew too. “Some Power purified what would have killed us all, and used it to transform the thing into the circle where the Companions could enter the world. That must be why the grain was so tight, and vertical—it was in motion when it was used! I should have seen that.”

Jonaton looked sympathetic and shrugged. “Took me a while to figure it out, too.”

“I can only think of one entity that would do something that—mad,” Isla said into the silence.

“The Adept?” Kordas asked tightly.

“Most likely,” Jonaton replied.

Kordas turned to face his son. “I’ve changed my mind. I don’t want you going north,” he said, his voice a little uneven. “It’s too great a risk. I—”

Restil held up his hand. “Are you still going to send another Herald?” he asked. “Or are you going to pull Delia and Pebble back?” Obviously they needed Menalus there—but Menalus was moving around a lot. He was a swiftly, and erratically, moving target, if he was even a target at all.

And Menalus wasn’t the Crown Prince.

“I’m leaving Delia and Pebble until their job is done, and yes, I am sending another Herald,” the King replied, eying his son speculatively. “Why?”

“Then send me. If you are sending a Herald, send me. We talked about this before, Father. How will people feel about risking their sons in danger if you won’t send yours? And besides,” he continued, as his father started to reply, then closed his mouth on what he was going to say, “people will know by this that we Heralds are not just pretty messengers. And people will know you are confident in Valdemar’s defenses. This is a crucial point. It’s not a crisis point, but it’s a crucial one. And the answer to it needs to be the right one. I think sending me is that right answer.”

He looked at his mother, expecting to see her ready to raise an objection. Her eyes were too bright, but she nodded slightly. “I agree,” she said quietly.

Kordas looked at Jonaton. Jonaton shrugged. “I’m not a mind reader, Kordas. I don’t know what that Adept is thinking. I don’t know what she’s planning. All I know is that she hasn’t tried anything else and she seems to be concentrating on her new army, so maybe she’s given up on trying anything magical against us. But I do think Restil is right. You do need to show people that the Heralds are more than messengers, and you need to show them that you won’t ask them to make sacrifices that you, yourself, won’t make.”

The King took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “All right, then,” he replied. “Restil, you’ll go, but I want Starbird to go with you. If something does happen, you’ll have a Healer right there. She needs more experience with ordinary Valdemarans. And she needs our sort of practical field experience; she knows how the Hawkbrothers do things, and . . . gods only know what that is . . . but she hasn’t seen how we operate.”

“There is another shading of meaning to all of this,” Isla continued. “We know the weapon was transformed. We certainly know why and by whom, even if the gods have been chary about taking credit for this—call it what it is—miracle. But something else occurs to me.” She waited to see if Jonaton would interrupt her, but for once, the mage didn’t. “It is very difficult for mortal folk to see the future, because the future is always in flux,” she continued, sounding like someone who was very sure of her ground. “That is why those who are said to be Gifted with Foresight can see only a limited way into the future, and any attempts to look further are composed of many future paths vying with each other, with little way to tell which is the most likely. But gods are not subject to the limitations of mortals when it comes to knowing what the future most likely holds.”

Jonaton was wearing that face that said “Is this going somewhere?” but the Queen pointedly ignored his expression.